ELABORATING THE SOUL: YAYOI KUSAMA’S LIFE’S BODY OF ART WORK AT THE TATE IN LONDON, ENGLAND

HALLELUJAH TRUTH CELEBRATES THE RED DOTS OF YAYOI KUSAMA. As an artist who has delighted in the use of dots in her work, I have been so exuberant about discovering the life's body of work by Yayoi Kusama!(art by Hallelujah Truth, Georgia Visionary Artist)

ENTRANCE TO THE TATE'S EXIBIT OF YAYOI KUSAMA

Hallelujah for Yayoi Kusama! Hallelujah for fellow SPIRITUAL ART PILGRIMS who do their SOUL WORK. Long live Kusama! On her JOURNEY, she has succeeded in becoming the CENTER of her CREATIONS and in creating a “KUSAMA-WORLD.” Hallelujah Truth approves of this artist who made herself not the focus of her own ART.

YAYOI BECOMES PART OF HER WORK! How splendid is the blogging world! At the Tate Modern (2012) is an expansive life retrospective of Yayoi Kasuma's work. In mid-May, I had the opportunity to see this exhibit, including this fantastic swirling snake-like Kasuma painting from the 1990's. It was displayed with other paintings from the era of her paintings of biological or cosmological imagery. However, it wasn't until I googled Yayoi Kusama and found this photo on Amber's blog that I saw Yayoi Kusama costumed in the design from this particular painting, which the Tate exhibit didn't include.  (image from Amber's Mouthwash blog)

WE ARE ALL DOTS. Yayoi Kusama started using dots in her art work as a child.  The dots, she explains, represent all of us and infinity too.  (I was not allowed to take photos in the exhibit, so this photo and others are my photographs of the posters hanging out in the cafe at the conclusion of the exhibit. Google Yayoi Kusama--the work she has produced is vast and uncountable and so much of it is available on the web.

INFINITY. Yayoi Kusama creates environments. Here is one of her infinity environments made with mirrors and lights. I had the good fortune of being able to walk through one of these at the Tate Modern exhibit.

MORE RECENT WORK.  Starting in 2009, Yayoi Kusama has been creating a body of work by painting on a monochromatic background and then filling its surface with different symbols and patterns. I was particularly moved by the titles of these paintings and wish that I had written them down. The language was focused on human relationships to one another and to the earth. One has to wonder if this focus comes with age, since Kusama was born in 1929 and is now 83.

A ROOM FULL OF RECENT WORKS. Hallelujah adores the way Yayoi Kusama places herself in relation to her work! At the Tate Modern, one entire room was filled with these evocative pieces. (photo from The Juvenilia)

Something to GET EXCITED ABOUT...

A feature documentary, Kusama: Princess of Polka Dots, is in post production. A short excerpt from this documentary was prepared for the Tate Modern 2012 exhibition. You can find out more about this documentary at this site, and you can friend the filmmakers on Facebook right here. Meanwhile enjoy:

To experience a wee bit more of the magnificence that is Yayoi Kusama, watch this short video:




ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS...

I will certainly be interested in reading a copy of Yayoi Kusama's autobiography, "Infinity Net," only recently translated from Japanese into English. I want to know more about how this SPIRITUAL ART PILGRIM lived her life successfully elaborating her SOUL.


I am so thankful for having my friend Denise, who lives in London and invited me and my Chiboogamoo to spend time with her and to go to Yayoi Kusama's exhibit at the Tate Modern. I also love and appreciate my Chiboogamoo, who shares this adventurous and wondrous JOURNEY with me. Kisses to you both! I acknowledge the brochure handed out at the exhibit for providing me with excellent information and the quotation from "Infinity Net" below.

Hallelujah (right) with friend Denise taken outside the Tate exhibit  in the cafe area.

My faithful companion Chiboogamoo, a man who does both science and art!

INFINITY AND AFFINITY.  I feel a deep connection with Yayoi Kusama.  I understand something about her work at a visceral level that is too difficult to express. (art by Hallelujah Truth, watercolor pencils on paper and photoshopped)

FROM HER AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Yayoi Kusama wrote in her autobiography, Infinity Net, the following: "For art like mine--art that does battle at the border of life and death, questioning what we are and what it means to live and die--[Japan] was too small, too servile, too feudalistic and too scornful of women. My art needed a more unlimited freedom and a wider world." 

What do you think PILGRIMS? What does your art need? Do you have unlimited freedom to create? Describe it to me? Hallelujah Truth wants to know!